


To Build a Home

by queensguardian



Series: All For The Game Musings [5]
Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Angst, Followed by Fluff, M/M, Neil protecting the team
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-26
Updated: 2018-09-26
Packaged: 2019-07-17 16:43:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16099667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queensguardian/pseuds/queensguardian
Summary: “Don’t you recognize me, Nathaniel?”Featuring Neil protecting the Foxes (and Andrew), saying "I'm Fine" one too many times, and Feelings.





	To Build a Home

**Author's Note:**

> For those of you who are new- you don't have to read the other parts in this series to read this (but you should! *shameless self-promotion*). The series is non-linear and can even be considered different aus-I'll certainly be adding different aus in the future!  
> Enjoy a little bit of action! Plus lots of soft feelings because I am a Human Trashcan  
> This is a little longer than my usual fics, but it was a lot of fun to write!  
> Love you guys, thanks for reading.

Neil should have been more alert.

It was the night after a game, and they had all stopped at a club about an hour away from home. Wymack had gone the rest of the way back to Palmetto with Abby, telling them not to have too much fun, and they were left piled into Matt and Andrew’s cars and pulling up to a dark club.

They had won the game, and everyone was floating on a cloud as they entered the club as a group. Neil had hung back with the Monsters, pulling a little at the tight black shirt he had on. He still had to fight a little discomfort at being noticeable; and his new scars only made things worse. But the armbands provided him a safety net, as well as Andrew’s warmth beside him and a hand slapping his own away from his fumbling.

Neil smiled at Andrew, which Andrew ignored, and they went to get a table for everyone. Allison and Renee got drinks and met everyone back at the booth. Most of the group had a couple drinks before leaving to join the dancing crowd. Only Andrew, Neil and Kevin remained, nursing their own drinks and sitting in companionable silence.

Neil took the opportunity to watch Andrew in the dark lights and the secrecy of their booth. His expression was as dead as always, and Neil smiled at the familiar sight. The fact that he was allowed to even have familiar sights was still a revelation. The fact that he could have a family was unbelievable.

“Staring,” Andrew muttered, but it lacked any real heat, and Andrew’s eyes only met his for a moment before returning to the crowd, where he was no doubt keeping an eye on the other Monsters.

Neil only hummed and kept staring. He still wasn’t a big drinker, and would probably nurse that same drink all night, but it was still...fun to be out with everyone. Fun to watch them drink and feel safe and warm. To feel like he belonged.

Eventually a couple of their friends made their way back to the table to rest their feet for a while and drink some more.

Matt had slouched back in his seat for a while, looking sweaty from the dancing and smiling like the sun. He had his arm lightly draped around Dan’s shoulders.

“Neil, do you want anything more to drink?” Dan had asked, just smiling when Neil shook his head.

Matt yawned widely, slapping a hand up to cover his mouth. “You know what, I could really use some fresh air. Want to come, Neil?”

Neil shrugged, slipping out of the booth after Matt. He glanced back and met Andrew’s eyes, smiling again. “We’ll be back in a little bit.”

Andrew looked away dismissively, but Neil knew he’d been waiting for Neil’s expressed desire to leave the table.

He trailed after Matt out of the club, basking in the way Matt managed to use his height to plow through the crowd, leaving a little space for Neil to stay in close behind him.

They made their way out the back of the club, light momentarily flooding the alley behind it, and Neil pulled out a cigarette and lit it, grounding himself in the smell. They walked a little ways away, to the end of the alleyway, so they could see the whole night sky spread out in front of them.

Matt didn’t comment, just leaned against the wall and breathed in the night air.

“I can’t believe we won last night,” He said, staring up at the night sky.

Neil hummed, holding the cigarette. He had known they would win, of course. He’d seen a gleam in Andrew’s eyes that, while more common these days was still rare enough to give him butterflies as they’d stepped out onto the court.

His ears prickled at a sound like gravel crunching under a shoe from around the corner. He tensed, dropping the cigarette.

“Did you hear that?” He asked Matt, feet already spread and ready to run, even if logically he knew that he wasn’t going anywhere.

“No,” Matt said slowly, looking at Neil. “Are you ok, Neil? What did you—“

Neil stepped in front of Matt, spreading his arm out, as a man stepped out from around the corner.

He was in dirty clothes, unshaven and unwashed, and Neil could see a desperate look in his eyes that Neil recognized from his own worst days. It was not a good sign.

Matt tried to step forward, but Neil just adjusted his stance, not moving his arm, and Matt fell still behind him.

Neil felt a fear drag its fingertips down his spine as he caught sight of a knife in each of the man’s hands. He had no doubt they would be sharpened.

“Why are you here?” Neil’s voice was flat, displaying none of the panic he felt.

“Don’t you recognize me, Nathaniel?”

Neil’s eyes flashed but he didn’t flinch. That didn’t stop Matt from cringing, but Neil didn’t acknowledge him; praying that he was smart enough not to say anything and draw attention to himself.

“You really don’t, do you? Well, I suppose that’s alright. It’s been awhile, after all. But surely you’ll remember why I’m here. Your father killed my wife, Nathaniel. You were young, but I know you remember. He made us watch.”

Neil swallowed as he was hit by the memory, and now he did recognize the man. Neil had only been five, but it had been the first time his father had tortured someone in front of him. Made him stand still and watch as Nathan had let Lola carve the woman up, slowly, as if she was savoring every moment.

 _“Are you paying attention, Nathaniel? Keep your eyes open.”_ Then Nathan had taken his cleaver and finished the job.

It wasn’t something Neil was likely to forget, even if the details of this man’s face had escaped him over the years.

“Oh yes, I can see that you remember now. Good. I wouldn’t want this to happen without you realizing why.” The man shifted, and Neil could see the knives glinting in the moonlight.

He felt lightheaded, his breath catching with the movement of the knives. “Why are you here, James? You have to know my father is dead, and Lola with him.”

James smiled, hard and cruel. Whatever he had been once, that person was long gone now. “Your father took the most important person I had away from me. I’m just here to return the favor.”

They were interrupted by the screech of the club doors opening, and the rest of the Foxes pouring out onto the street.

“Neil, Matt, what’s going on—“

Neil heard Allison’s sharp cry, but it felt far away, like he was suddenly standing underwater and away from the rest of them. He was moving unconsciously.

_Too slow too slow—_

The moment James shifted into a lunge toward Andrew, Neil’s body was throwing itself in the way.

He and James hit the ground hard, but Neil didn’t even notice the hard gravel scraping against his back. He grabbed one knife by the blade, not feeling it cut into his palm as he wrested it away from James. The other knife had vanished, and Neil was grateful, somewhere in the back of his mind where he had room for rational thought, that he only had to deal with the one.

He knocked James back, finally getting the knife out of his grip and flinging it away from them both. That momentary distraction was enough for James to get a good punch in to the side of his head, and he reeled back onto the ground.

Then the Foxes were on them, Matt and Aaron and Renee dragging James away. The man knew he’d been beaten, and he was laughing hysterically, breathing hard even though Neil hadn’t managed to hit him that hard. Neil could hear sirens in the distance, and he had the presence of mind to realize that someone must’ve called the cops. But Neil couldn’t seem to get up. He was lying on the ground, gasping a little wetly from the fight, which couldn’t have lasted more than thirty seconds, though it felt a lot longer than that.

He realized that someone was saying his name, and he looked over to see Andrew leaning over him.

“Oh. Hi, Andrew. You’re ok.” He didn’t bother trying to touch the blond, who had a distinctly panicked look in his eyes. Huh, that was interesting. Neil didn’t think he’d ever seen that look before.

He sat up, and slowly began the painful process of trying to stand, before being shoved back into a horizontal position by Andrew.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Andrew said gruffly, keeping his hand firmly on Neil’s shoulder.

“Trying to stand? Andrew come on, it’s just a scratch, I’m f—“

“Shut the fuck up, Neil.” Nicky hissed from where he was standing with the group around a now silent James. A silent, limp, James. Someone must have knocked him out. Neil thought bemusedly that it was probably Renee.

The Foxes were staring at him with a mixture of horror and concern.

“What, guys? Look, I’ve been through worse, really, it’s fine. I’ll show you, Andrew, just let me up—“

“Look down, you idiot,” Andrew said, his fingers twitching hard into Neil’s shoulder.

Neil dragged his eyes away from Andrew’s and saw...oh.

“So that’s where the other knife went,” he mumbled, and heard Matt give out a little choked sob. Sure enough, James’s other knife was sticking out of Neil’s abdomen. He still didn’t feel it. Adrenalin was a hell of a drug.

“It wasn’t that big of a knife, and it didn’t hit any organs. I’ll be fine.” Neil eyed the knife clinically, and was reaching to probe at the wound when Andrew grasped both of his hands, seemingly uncaring of the blood still dripping from his left one.

The Foxes not currently guarding James came a little closer to Neil, until Andrew’s hissed command stopped them. Neil let his head fall back against the ground, grunting when he saw stars for a minute.

“I think I have a concussion,” he said matter-of-factly, eyes on the midnight sky.

“Yeah no shit,” Allison said, but Neil could hear the shaky note to her voice.

The pain was finally starting to hit when the police and ambulance arrived. Neil’s breath was coming in short bursts, and he twisted his fingers in Andrew’s until they were holding hands. He fought a rush of nausea.

The paramedics lifted Neil onto a stretcher despite his protests that he could walk by himself, and they didn’t argue when Andrew went to hoist himself in the ambulance, throwing his keys at Nicky before he did so.

“It’s good you left the knife in,” one of the paramedics said. “Not everyone is that smart.”

“We’ll see you at the hospital,” Nicky said thickly, as the cops cuffed a stirring James.

Andrew nodded, and the ambulance doors slammed shut.

The ambulance ride was mostly silent. Andrew still held Neil’s (non-bloody) hand, and the paramedics talked to each other as they set up around Neil. Andrew heard Neil mutter something, and poked him until Neil looked at him.

“I said, this is going to be expensive. I don’t have medical insurance. We shouldn’t have called them. I could have just stitched this up myself.”

“You have the money. And I would like for you to hold that thought and say that again in front of the other Foxes.” Andrew said flatly, and he didn’t speak again for the rest of the ride.

#

Neil did indeed have a concussion. A minor one, thankfully, to go with his stab wound and the gash in his hand. The other Foxes arrived at the hospital only a little after the ambulance did, and they joined Andrew in the waiting room while Neil was taken back to be stitched up.

The air in the room was tense. Andrew didn’t ask what happened to James, though he knew they would all be asked to give a statement about what happened eventually.

Matt looked terrible; pale and washed out, like he was about to be sick.

“What did he want,” Andrew said, and everyone looked surprised to hear him speak.

Matt swallowed, his lip trembling a little. “He...he said that Neil’s dad had killed his wife in front of him...in front of him and Neil. And that since Nathan had taken what was most important to him, he was going to ‘return the favor.’”

Andrew processed that, thinking about the fact that the man had lunged toward the Foxes—no, toward him—instead of Neil. He had just assumed that the man was one of Nathan’s goons, there to try some half-assed assassination.

“He was there for me,” Andrew said flatly. It was an acknowledgement of the facts, but it was also a truth he felt the others hadn’t earned; a truth he hadn’t even wanted to tell himself.

Acknowledging the fact that the man was exchanging his wife’s life for Andrew’s own meant acknowledging that Andrew meant more to Neil than he was ever supposed to.

Because he wasn’t supposed to be Neil’s answer.

The other Foxes were quiet for a moment, and then Wymack walked through the doors and they erupted into sound, all trying to explain what had happened at once.

Andrew settled back into silence, ignoring them all and waiting for Neil.

When the doctor finally came out to say that Neil was going to be fine, and that he was insisting on being released now instead of staying the night, they all breathed a sigh of relief.

“Tylenol for the pain, though he’s refusing medication at the moment. And who’s going to be looking after him?” The doctor said, eyes moving over the large group in front of him.

Andrew stepped forward silently.

“Right. You’ll need to wake him up every couple of hours. His concussion is mild, but you still need to make sure he’s waking up normally. By tomorrow night you shouldn’t need to continue. Also, you may want to keep an eye on his wounds. Make sure he isn’t over-exerting himself. He seems eager to get back to his regular activities—“

“I’ll just _bet_ he is—“ someone muttered.

“—but he should take it easy, at least until his stitches are out and his concussion has healed. And no swimming.”

With that, the doctor turned on his heel and left, and shortly after Neil was returned to them, wearing his ripped shirt and jeans, a bandage visible under the tear.

He looked vaguely annoyed, as if the whole thing was a hassle, but he had a bruise blossoming across the side of his face, and exhaustion pulling at his eyes.

“We’re going home,” Andrew said, reaching forward and waiting for Neil to close the distance between them, holding his hand.

The others wisely chose not to say anything about this unexpected display, and they all piled into the two cars they had taken to drive the hour back to campus.

Andrew kept a tight grip on the wheel the whole time, his eyes flicking over every once in a while to the passenger seat as if to reassure himself that Neil was still there.

Neil himself fell asleep almost immediately—with the threat neutralized his adrenalin had left and he was exhausted and hurting. He leaned his forehead against the cool window and no one bothered him.

Aaron, Nicky and Kevin shared the backseat silently; Nicky and Kevin slept too, from tears and alcohol respectively.

But Aaron stayed awake the whole time. He stared between his brother and Neil. He’d seen what they all had; Neil hadn’t even hesitated before throwing himself between the Foxes (Andrew) and the threat. In the precious seconds it had taken the rest of them to reach him he could have easily been killed. It was enough to leave all of them shocked. It wasn’t as though they hadn’t seen Neil hurt before. It wasn’t even as if they’d never seen him risk himself for their sakes before.

But never like this. Never for such an imminent threat. Aaron wasn’t surprised at all, and he suspected that neither were the rest of the Foxes. It was just as Andrew had said; Neil had a martyr complex, and he’d do anything for his found family. And Aaron knew what it had taken the Foxes a while to find out (some of them probably hadn’t fully accepted it until tonight); Neil loved Andrew, and would do anything for him. And Aaron knew it was mutual, even if neither of them would ever say it out loud.

After all, Neil had attacked Aaron when he tested him. And Andrew had broken his promise in order to be with Neil. Even if it took the idiots a lifetime to accept their feelings about each other, Aaron knew love when he saw it.

He felt very mixed about the whole thing. On the one hand, he still wasn’t comfortable with homosexuality. He was better than he had been before Nicky had come into their lives, but still. And after everything Andrew had been through, the idea of him ever wanting to be with a man made Aaron sick to his stomach.

But he also saw the way Andrew looked at Neil when the idiot wasn’t looking. And he couldn’t help that small part of him that just wanted to see his twin happy and safe and relaxed from being relieved. After all, if anyone was fucked up enough to handle Andrew, it was Neil.

#

The Foxes all piled blankets and pillows on the floor of Matt and Aaron’s room. It was different from after Baltimore, but everyone was still rattled enough to need each other’s company. But Andrew took one look at Neil, and dragged him by the hand to their room; just the two of them.

The rest of the Foxes watched them go without comment; they knew the boys needed to talk, and they also knew they could relax as long as everyone was close by and in the tower.

Andrew shut the door softly as Neil got ready for bed, his motions a little clumsy. He threw his ripped clothes onto the floor haphazardly, and after a moment’s deliberation pulled on one of Andrew’s sweatshirts and a pair of soft shorts and stood by the ladder to his bed, frowning.

Andrew sighed; he couldn’t deal with Neil’s consideration for his own boundaries right now. He really couldn’t.

“Get in bed. 110%.” He pointed to the bottom bunk, and Neil didn’t have a witty reply for once; he just smiled softly and climbed into the bed.

He left Andrew space to climb in against the wall, which Andrew did after changing. Andrew deliberated for a moment, eyes narrowed in a glare, before he reached out between them for Neil’s hand, which he gave happily.

“Matt told me what happened,” Andrew said quietly. “That man—he was there for me.”

It wasn’t a question, so Neil didn’t answer.

Andrew was glaring again. “I don’t like that we—that we are weakness.”

Neil did respond this time. “What are you talking about?”

“This could happen again. Don’t deny it. Someone coming after one of us to get to the other. We are a weak point for each other.”

The fact that Andrew was conceding Neil as a weakness for him made Neil’s heart jump in his chest. It was a big admission, coming from Andrew. One that didn’t come easily.

“We might be a weak spot for each other,” Neil said, before squeezing Andrew’s fingers hard. “But we are far more a strength. You know it’s true.”

Andrew didn’t say anything, but his eyes darted away from Neil’s and then back again. He didn’t believe him.

“Andrew, you’re the reason I stayed,” Neil was almost whispering; it felt like he might scare Andrew away if he spoke too loudly. “You’re my home. I always buy your favorite ice cream, and you always let me steal your cigarettes. You gave me a phone, and you were there when I called. We don’t flinch away from the worst parts of each other. We’re stronger together.”

Andrew didn’t appear to be breathing. He was staring at Neil with a half-angry, half-desperate expression. He closed his eyes for a moment, before returning the fierce grip Neil still had on his fingers.

“Ok.” He didn’t need to say anything like what Neil had said. His very acceptance of Neil’s words was enough. The fact that he was still here, after everything, was enough.

Facing the future was scary. It reminded Neil of all his time on the road, never knowing which turn would lead back to his father. But he’d never had a family like this before. He’d never had something to hold onto. And he would fight for that until his dying breath.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks again for reading everyone! I hope you enjoyed!


End file.
